A dicing technique has been developed, in which a semiconductor wafer is cut into pieces of semiconductor chips by emitting a laser beam to a dicing area of the semiconductor wafer. In the dicing technique, crystals inside the semiconductor wafer are modified by the laser beam and then, from the modified portions, the semiconductor wafer is split into the pieces of the semiconductor chips.
On the side faces of each semiconductor chip manufactured in the above way, a modified layer by means of the laser beam improves adhesiveness with a package resin and also improves an impurity gettering effect. On the other hand, such a modified layer decreases the strength of the semiconductor chip itself, which may lead to defects of elements formed on the semiconductor chip.